a feeling of non-existence

Anthi Koulama

I don’t know what a house is
Is it a coat?
Or an umbrella if it rains?
I have filled it with bottles,
rags, wooden ducks,
curtains, fans
It seems I never want to leave it
Then it’s a cage
That imprisons whoever passes by
Even a bird like you, dirty with snow
But what we told each other
Is so light that it cannot be kept in.

Tonino Guerra

A journey into an abandoned neoclassical villa that was vandalized and burned. Inspired and based on Tonino Guerra’s untitled poem, that was dedicated to Andrei Tarkovsky (you can hear it in ‘Voyage in time’), and in the allegory of Plato’s Cave. Anthi Koulama is a Greek born, Athens based photographer, introduces herself with this short photo journal, where she revisits the term “what a house is” in conjunction with the allegory of fire in Plato’s cave.

When the prisoners manage to release themselves from their bonds and realize that reality in not what they thought it was
Like Plato’s cave you discover the fire that blurs the human condition, forever bound to the impressions created by your senses
You might for the first time experience a feeling of non-existence.